Saturday, March 09, 2013

He put up a fight, but Garikoitz Bravo was forced to let go of the climber's jersey on Friday's third stage of Tirreno-Adriatico.

The new Euskaltel recruit grabbed the green jersey by forming part of the break of the day on day two, and was once again animating the race from up ahead on Friday in the hope of keeping hold of the mountain's lead. Joining him in the break was Cesare Benedetti of NetApp-Endura who'd so narrowly been beaten to the jersey yesterday by Bravo, and Vini Fantini-Selle Italia's Francesco Failli.

Only one categorized climb was included on the 198km ride from Indicatore to Narni Scalo, and Benedetti was to get his revenge by besting Euskaltel's 23-year-old rookie. Bravo was thus forced to hand over the green jersey after only a day wearing it.

Back in the peloton, Samuel Sánchez got through another day unscathed and without ceding any time, while the rest same can't be said of all of his team-mates (as the results show below).